Settlers & Native Americans

What about the Native Americans?  The increasing number of US settlers moving west inevitably affected Native American communities.  Many Native Americans tried to keep their cultural traditions, even when moved from their lands, others assimilated to the advancing white culture, and others although few in numbers, fought hard to keep whites away from their homes.

The Black Hawk War What was the Black Hawk War?

The Middle Ground  The place that neither the Native Americans nor the settlers dominated in the west is known as the Middle Ground.  As long as settlers needed Native Americans as trading partners and guides, relations between settlers and Native Americans could be beneficial.  The Middle ground was well west of the Mississippi, because of the Indian Removal Act, and other Indian removal treaties had pushed them off their eastern lands for settlers.

Fort Laramie Treaty  As settlers moved west, Native Americans often fought them.  The US government responded to the settlers’ fears of attack by calling a conference near what is now Laramie, Wyoming.  The Cheyenne, Arapaho, Sioux, Crow, and others joined the US representatives in swearing: “to maintain good faith and friendship in all their mutual intercourse, and to make an effective and lasting peace”